the one eyed tiny man scanned the room and then shortly settled into a lotus position atop its Core.
I reentered Luciantisss', or I suppose Lu Xians', Core and found instead of the struggling ghost there sat the fleshborn avatar atop the stele. I approached and it opened its singular large eye at my approach. I took a moment to collect my thoughts before asking the first thing that came to mind.
"So, how are you feeling?"
The Avatar looked around themself and with a squint, that creased the sides of its face with smile lines, nodded its head.
"I had a few plans in order to defend this place, do you mind if I take advantage of some of the resources you and your vitapygmy have gathered?"
The Avatar bobbed its head in ascent as a look of sadness takes over the creatures singular eye. I couldn't tell if the sadness came from the need to defend the dungeon or their inability to do so themself.
"The vitapygmy have a way to make the small fleshborn much bigger. It's kind of messy but I'm sure they would be willing to help you out in any way they can."
Another sad expression and then a moment of contemplation followed by a shrug. They then closed their eye and apeared to take a deep breath, even though I was pretty sure the fleshborn didn't have lungs, and began to hum. It was pretty clear that was all the conversation I was going to get for now and decided to get to work on my other plans.
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Outside the vitapygmy were in an uproar. Gathering items and running to and fro. It was hard to get them to pause to help me with my next big project. The Priestess and her honor guard were definitely too distracted but I was able to snag one of the newer vitapygmy to help out. I was pretty sure that with the language barrier they thought that getting them to gather up a basket of glowing Life Berries and then slathering them with Caramelized Life Mana was in preparation for whatever celebration or ceremony the priestess was organizing. I hoped it wouldn't be to much of an issue to borrow them. thought they did start to get a little worried once we left their territory and made our way deeper into mine.
I was going to set up a Dire Nimbus Crab Habitat and then try to see if I could empower them with Life Mana. I chose the chamber that sat between the Dire Hare Habitat and the Grange. Settling the mote of power into the room the ceiling shifted pulling down knobby stalactites. The space between the stone protrusions then filled with thick fog and then everything went still. It was the least spectacular room so far but maybe the crabs just liked damp caves so they didn't need a lot of extra things to feel at home.
Soon the tap tap of water began to drip from the stone points which was then joined by a nearly identical but off tempo tapping. A long pointed leg descended from the clouds followed by a limb equipped with a narrow pair of pinching claws testing the surface ahead of itself as it descended into view. It was slightly smaller then a vitapygmy if you didn't include the ridged wing like protrusions on the sides of its shell which in effect tripled its width.It wobbled as it walked in a kind of stick bug dance as its blue-grey winged shell would swirl the mist around them keeping its exact position vague although not exactly hidden. Upon seeing the vitapygmy with the basket of offered berries it began foaming at the mouth and then with a swift swipe of its claw popped a number of the bubbles and swooped down in a graceful cloud bank and landed on the poor terrified moppet.
Congratulations Achievement become
Pack [https://i.imgur.com/YGbxZlQ.png]
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Pack Get
Achievement Effect Pack [https://i.imgur.com/YGbxZlQ.png] Option additional leadership slot
With a minimal prodding It dug into the sticky berries and the result was rather underwhelming. As it gobbled down the berries and chewed them it was clearly a highly nutritious and healthy meal but beyond that eating the Caramelized Mana had little effect. My dire hare licked its lips and wiggled its nose clearly pining for a taste of the clearly delectable snack so I relented and gave them permission to try some. I also encouraged the crab to offer one to the vitapygmy in hopes that it would at least stop shaking so much which seemed to work if only a little.
With the meal finished and the test ultimately a failure the Nimbus Crab made to jump back up to its perch but was stymied by the fact that its mouth parts were lightly coated in Caramelized Life Mana and as it started to bubble it wound up filling its mouth with a plethora of sticky green orbs. This at least had the effect that the vitapygmy was no longer afraid of my crab and through mild chuckles attempted to help remedy my monsters pitiful situation. The orbs quickly dried and though most of them popped or collapsed I was left with a dozen Green fist sized hard shelled bubbles and then an Achievement popped up.
Congratulations Achievement become
Fabrication [https://i.imgur.com/XHjoHP4.png]
Fabricator
Achievement Effect Fabrication [https://i.imgur.com/XHjoHP4.png] Option of Production related chambers and chamber upgrades
This was interesting and was similar to the Battle Be Joined Achievement in what it gave me. Where that one gave me the Sand Pit chamber this one gave me a chamber called Stockpile whose description just said 'Items'. I still didn't know how to upgrade chambers yet but something told me that it was probably something that I gained access to once I 'become'. As for the bubbles, checking them with my Domain showed, they were called Lifemist Grenades.
I quickly had my crab toss one against a nearby wall and as the thin crystalline coating shattered it released a sparkly verdant mist that quickly dissipated. I didn't have the life affinity to really tell what the sudden spike in Life Mana meant but I could guess that it was probably some sort of aerosolized healing mist.
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I let the Vitapygmy return to their own turf with a Lifemist Grenade as a thank you for their help the opposite of dangerous so I didn't mind letting one go. They returned home and immediately joined in on the active preparations for a celebration. From the snippets of conversation I could grasp they didn't seem to understand what the Fleshborn Avatar was but they had been quite stressed over the past several weeks that this sudden clear message of their gods favor was as good a reason as any to blow off some steam. I was also met with a prompt of a successful Raid since apparently eating the berries that the Vitapygmy had brought with them was counted as ambushing a caravan and the crab leaping onto the vitapygmy was counted as a tackle. It was always odd what the system decided what was important and what wasn't
While they were all focused on their preparations it gave me time to think. It had been a couple weeks since the delvers ran off so they would likely be arriving any day now. We definitely weren't ready for them and I wasn't sure what the delvers would do if they didn't find the Mana Pearls they were expecting or if they didn't find a Fleshborn Behemoth to fight. I was going to try and see if I could get the celebrations to turn into something beneficial for the dungeon as a whole but I wasn't sure what to press for more insistently.
Maybe I did need to blow off some steam myself a bit. It was stressful being a magic floating orb.